Whatever the critics may think, writers still have a touching faith in
the old-fashioned novel, and it is fascinating to see just what
products can emerge when a modern novelist sets about writing one.
Spring Snow is the first installment of Yukio Mishima's latest
fictional testament. Three more volumes will follow, the final one
delivered to the publisher only a day before the author killed himself
by ritual disembowelment (seppuku) after his bizarre attempt to foment
an uprising in the Japanese...